


No One Can See Us

by fasterassembly (signalbeam)



Category: Persona 4
Genre: Attempted Striptease, F/F, Fluff, Homophobia, Love Hotels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-12
Updated: 2011-06-12
Packaged: 2017-10-20 08:53:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,029
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/210970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/signalbeam/pseuds/fasterassembly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Chie and Yukiko find some privacy in Okina City. Granted, it's in a love hotel, but they're not picky.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No One Can See Us

“Look!” Chie said, as though they were seeing Canada after crossing the entire Pacific Ocean in a rowboat instead of arriving at a love hotel in the middle of Okina City. It hadn’t said so explicitly, but Yukiko was sure that she had seen at least three strippers on her way here. Or maybe they were… well. For hire, so to speak. They had to be cold, yet there they were, baring their midriffs in the middle of January. The undersides of their breasts, at least, had to be a bit chilly. Maybe they liked it that way, though. “I think we’re here.”

“We are walking through the front door,” Yukiko said. She peered at the vending machine in the corner of the room, and then over at Chie, who was searching for her wallet. But her bag was so small that she couldn’t possibly be having as much trouble as she was pretending to have.

The receptionist seemed to be too bored to pay them much mind, which only seemed to make Chie clumsier. It wasn’t one of those modern love hotels Yukiko had seen on TV, where you didn’t have to talk to someone, just pick a room off of the dashboard and slip money to the person behind a screen, but if it were like that, Yukiko suspected she would have rather rented a karaoke room. It was more exciting this way.

Yukiko touched the ends of her hair, and wondered if this would be any easier if Yukiko had suggested a sleepover instead of being so straightforward and blithely suggesting that they do… this. She wondered—she wondered if anyone else from Inaba would be here. Inaba was a small town, and though it pained her to say so, Okina was a small city. Perhaps Souji liked to come out here, or maybe Yosuke, or maybe the two of them together. And while she was giggling over the idea of Souji sweet talking Yosuke into love hotels, Chie had worked up the nerve to pay for a room and was now waiting for her at the stairwell.

“I had to tell her that we were waiting for someone before she’d give me a key,” Chie said when they were halfway up the stairs.

“What? Why?”

“I don’t know,” Chie said, although her brow was raised and knotted in thought. Chie took Yukiko’s hand and, with tight lips, kissed Yukiko’s cheek.

It was a straight path from the stairwell to their room. The room itself was plain and subdued. After Shirakawa Boulevard, Yukiko had been expecting—well, she supposed that she had been expecting a waterbed, pink walls, and a suggestion of penises or vulvae in every element of the décor. But this one had a single bed, a small plasma television hooked up to a VHS player, and a small coffee table with a couch. There were no windows, though Yukiko knew that they were on the third floor, and had a vague idea of the direction they were facing. On the table was a coffee maker and styrofoam cups and milk and sugar. Yukiko set her bag against the door while Chie took off her shoes and socks. Her shoulders were still tense and Yukiko, in turn, was becoming nervous, too.

“Did she charge you extra?”

“No,” Chie said. “It doesn’t matter, okay?”

“It’s bothering you,” Yukiko said.

“Well, yeah,” Chie said. “Ugh, I wound up telling her that Yosuke—I so don’t want to think about Yosuke naked. –Are you trying—”

“You brought him up first,” Yukiko said, and she covered her cheek with a hand to check for the temperature, and oh, goodness. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know—”

“Wh—do you actually find him—”

“No!” Yukiko knew that she shouldn’t be giggling now, but she couldn’t help it. The idea of Yosuke naked—she would have to apologize to Yosuke later, because she couldn’t picture it, not unless Yosuke was crossing his legs and hiding behind a towel. Chie looked like she needed to sit down, or needed someone else to sit down so she could kick them. The jealousy was charming, really, once you got used to it.

Yukiko stifled one last laugh, and then beckoned Chie up for a kiss. That seemed to loosen Chie up a bit and make her stop thinking. There were always so many things going through Chie’s head. Sometimes she needed a bit of—prompting. So to speak.

Chie unzipped her jacket, and Yukiko helped tug it off. A small part of her felt trashy, or perhaps just suspicious, and another part of her was glad that they could finally do this without keeping an eye out for Chie’s mother or a maid or the dog or the neighbors or Mr. Noto, who had nearly walked in on them in the unused storage room at the Inn at least twice. It hadn’t been so bad at first, but lately they’d start and get halfway through and then, suddenly, Chie would sit up and say, “ _Do you hear that_ ” as though they were out in the woods and Chie suspected a bear. So it was nice to have this slow, unhurried pace, too, as though they had all the time in the world. Or at least, they’d have the next two hours. It’d be enough.

“We should come here again,” Yukiko said.

“We’ve barely even started,” Chie said. 

Yukiko thought that was a bit beside the point. She removed her headband, shook her hair loose, and was pleased to see Chie watching her in a way that almost suggested sleepiness, but promised anything but. Yukiko took a step back, Chie a step forward, and then she tumbled into the bed with a little scream, half excited and half nervous. The sheets smelled clean and inoffensive, and maybe a bit soapy. They had wrinkled them already, and the best part was that they wouldn’t have to straighten them later. No one would see them out here, she realized, or walk in on them or eye them in an odd way after they exited a room together. The thought of that made her stretch out on the bed. Her hand, which she had first meant to just move her hair out of the way, slid down to the scarf knotted at her neck, then collarbone, then between her breasts. 

“Geeze,” Chie said, and she seemed to say it with awe. She looked over her shoulder, and Yukiko shook her head and tugged at Chie’s arm.

“Don’t,” Yukiko said. “No one’s there.” 

“I know,” Chie said. “It’s just second nature.” 

Yukiko bit down on her lower lip, and was fascinated that Chie had noticed and was responding to it. It was strange, feeling as though she had this power over someone, to make them turn their heads just by smoothing her hair back, or by wearing the same thing she always did with a little modification. Rise must feel like this often, but for a different reason—maybe the difference was that Yukiko didn’t feel like a performer and Chie didn’t feel like an audience. 

“Don’t look back,” Yukiko said, and pulled Chie down into the bed with her, then rolled on top. She sat up, and Chie’s legs parted. Yukiko resisted the urge to touch. “You might miss something.” 

Chie breathed in so sharply that Yukiko could hear it. “You’re being a tease.” 

Yukiko worked at the scarf at her neck. It was trickier than it seemed in the past. She had done this before hundreds of times, yet when she needed to do it sexily, her nails didn’t seem long enough to catch the knot, or she was clumsy because she was trying to be—appealing, or something of the sort. It didn’t seem to affect the growing desire in either of them. She swore that Chie’s eyes were dilating. “Is that a bad thing?” she said. 

“No.”

“Good,” Yukiko said, as the thing finally came loose. She tried to make a show of discarding it behind her, but her arm jerked funnily, and in the end the scarf didn’t so much flutter as it flopped onto the bed. 

“Pfft—” 

“I’m trying!” Yukiko said, her cheeks warming. She hit Chie’s shoulder with her palm. “It’s harder than it looks.” 

“No, I believe it,” Chie said. “It’s good! You’re good.”

Hearing that from Chie made her entire body tingle. Yukiko tried to make her smile sultry, but she wasn’t sure it was working, because Chie was smiling back. 

“I’m not bad,” Yukiko said. She dragged a finger along Chie’s layers of shirts, going from skin to cloth on a whim. 

“The opposite of bad,” Chie said, trying to argue, but she seemed to fall apart as Yukiko took Chie’s hand and kissed the knuckles. She let her tongue flit over the skin, then turned Chie’s hand over to kiss the palm more wetly. Chie tried to pull her down for a proper kiss, but Yukiko resisted, even as she felt Chie’s legs scrunch together in protest. “Ugh, I’ve changed my mind. You’re the worst.”

“How rude,” Yukiko said, but she was happy. Next time, Chie could be the one to reveal herself, part the layers—she shivered at the thought. 

“It’s only because,” Chie said, her eyes hazy as they swept across Yukiko’s body, “you’re doing this.”

“This?” She took the hand that she had just been kissing and dragged it along the front of her dress. Chie’s fingers reached, in vain, for a breast, then for her hip. Yukiko took the hand as far down as her thigh, then picked up the other one. The hand she had released dropped back onto the bed. 

“Damn it,” Chie muttered as Yukiko kissed the other hand. She screwed her eyes shut, and for that, Yukiko worked her tongue particularly hard against the grooves of Chie’s dry hand. Yukiko was finding it hard to keep her breathing even. Watching Chie watch her—she swore that she was getting wet, just from that. 

“Take off your shirt,” she said. “And I’ll let you touch.” 

Chie opened one eye. “You first.” 

“No.”

Both eyes open, now. “At least let me unzip the dress.”

“That’s why I’m telling you to take off your shirt, Chie,” she said, and meant for it to sound stern or humored, but she was sure she sounded hopelessly horny instead. 

The shirt came off almost instantly, then the tank top underneath. Yukiko helped with the camisole and bra, and as she did, Chie’s hand reached behind her and grabbed onto the zipper. The zipper came undone in jerks; Yukiko was worried that it might snag, but then it slid down her arms and her back was suddenly exposed. She caught Chie eyeing the bra she was wearing, and swallowed. She decided to take her panties off before she ruined them, and Chie’s eyes fluttered fast, as though there was too much to look at and she wasn’t sure where to start. 

“Off,” Chie muttered, rising up to help Yukiko out of the dress, and then they were kissing and all pretenses of taking things slow vanished. Yukiko’s back hit the sheets again, but this time without anything between her skin and the bed. 

She wrapped her arms around Chie, and pressed her closer. She felt desperate, suddenly, for more. Chie’s hand sneaked between their bodies, rubbed against her nipple through the bra, and then between her legs. Yukiko heard, as though from a distance, Chie’s skirt swish, and felt the too-smooth fabric of her bike shorts against her leg, this one much closer. Chie’s fingers pressed against her, rocking with a slow, steady rhythm—but Yukiko didn’t have the patience for that now. She reached down and guided those fingers against her entrance. 

“I knew it,” Chie said, as she pushed a finger in. Yukiko shuddered, and dug her fingers into Chie’s back. 

“Wh—knew what?” she said.

“That striptease was just meant to get you all worked up.” 

The flush on her face and neck and chest wasn’t _entirely_ Chie’s fault. She was never going to strip for Chie again. “Y-you try doing that in a—dress,” Yukiko said, tilting her hips for a better angle. Chie laughed into Yukiko’s chest, and then slid another finger alongside the first, her other hand still working at the nipple. “Th—there aren’t enough…” _Layers_ , was what she meant to say. Chie’s fingers curved and pushed, and the heel of her palm ground against Yukiko’s clit. Words seemed pointless, after that. 

“Yeah, I guess,” Chie said, and then her teeth scraped against Yukiko’s neck, tongue leaving hot, wet trails by her throat. Her leg hooked around the back of Chie’s thighs, pulling her closer. She felt awful, not helping Chie, but she was afraid that if she did, Chie would stop.

“Harder, Chie,” she said, and Chie did, working at Yukiko relentlessly until she came, hot and fast into Chie’s hands. Chie eased up after that, but didn’t stop. Yukiko could feel her head getting fuzzy again. She pressed her hands against Chie’s shoulder, and Chie stopped kissing her neck. Chie slid her fingers out of Yukiko, though now they were tracing around her clit and that was just as maddening. “What are you—”

“Ssh,” Chie said, her smile pleased and wet around the mouth. And then the finger circled closer and the second orgasm came more like an ambush—but an ambush by small children, armed with sticks instead of an ambush by Shadows. She didn’t know. She didn’t care, either.

Chie went back to kissing her neck until Yukiko pushed Chie away, and buried her head into Chie’s shoulder. Her hands ran along Chie’s body, and then settled on Chie’s hip, rubbing smaller and smaller circles into it. Chie’s hands, one dry and the other sticky and liquid, gripped onto Yukiko’s shoulders. Yukiko turned her head and took Chie’s fingers into her mouth. The taste of herself, by now, was nearly familiar. Chie’s other hand gripped her hair.

“Y-you’re _evil_ ,” Chie said, from in between gasps. “You’ve been—you’ve been teasing me this entire time.”

“You won’t be saying that ten minutes from now,” Yukiko said, releasing Chie’s fingers from her mouth.

“Sure,” Chie grumbled, as she tossed off her bike shorts and panties. “If you ever get there.”

“There?”

Chie blushed. “Y-you know where.”

Indeed she did.

“Maybe you just need a little push?” She stroked Chie’s entrance with her fingers, rubbing against her inner folds. Chie gasped, and the sound of Yukiko’s name made her head go light. She took a nipple into her mouth, rolling it in her tongue, and then kissed a trail down.

 

*

 

Chie insisted on a shower, but since there wasn’t a hairdryer, Yukiko just cleaned off her hands and face and wiped herself down with a towel. She didn’t want her hair to freeze in the cold. No one believed her when she said that it had happened to her before, and truthfully, it was rarely cold enough in Inaba for it to happen too often, but once was enough to make her cautious. She went downstairs to check out the vending machines. She was thirsty and had some change rattling around in her purse.

The same receptionist was still there, eyeing her oddly. Yukiko bought a can of warm red bean soup and a plastic bottle of Lipovitan.

“Excuse me,” the receptionist said, and Yukiko froze, half-thinking that the receptionist was going to ask her if Yosuke was having any trouble getting there. “Might I recommend the name of one of our sister hotels?”

A pamphlet was pushed into Yukiko’s hands before she could word even a token protest. ‘Heart RAINBOW Leisure,’ the pamphlet read.

“It’s very popular with people such as yourself,” the receptionist said. “The price is nearly the same. Even a little cheaper.”

“Thank you,” Yukiko said. “I’ll be sure to consider it.” She took the pamphlet and the can of red bean soup and the Lipovitan and went back to her room. She was certain that had been a message, and she didn’t have to guess at what it was. So that was what Chie had been so upset about. Yukiko threw the pamphlet into the trash bin and fell into the bed.

“Ugh, the water was awful,” Chie said, stepping out of the shower a few minutes later. “Are you ready to go? I think we only have like, half an hour left.”

“We could stay here for a while longer,” Yukiko said. Chie must have sensed the receptionist’s distaste for them right away. She felt silly, now, for not recognizing it at first. Not for the first time, she wondered how often things like this had happened without her noticing. She wasn’t naïve. She knew that there were many people, both in Inaba and Japan as a whole, who would too gladly shun her if they knew about her and Chie; but running into one of those people in the city, small as this one was, left her with a dry bitterness in her mouth. She opened her can of red bean soup.

“Well, it’ll take me half an hour to dry off and stuff. I don’t want my clothes to be wet when we get outside.”

Chie was toweling herself off. Yukiko snuck a look at Chie’s bare stomach and breasts, and then stared into her soup can.

“Take your time,” Yukiko said. She sat at the couch and brewed a cup of coffee at the coffee maker that she had no intention of drinking out of petty, unladylike spite.

 

*

 

They left the love hotel on time. Neither of them suggested staying longer, partially because they were both a bit tired, and maybe for other reasons, too. They had eaten lunch in the city and arrived at the love hotel not long after. By the time they left, it was sunset. Yukiko wasn’t hungry, but Chie said that most of the restaurants in the shopping district would be closed by the time they got back, so off to dinner they went. Yukiko didn’t point out that they could have just gone home and eaten something from the Inn. Chie liked eating out, although truth be told, she mostly just liked the steak.

“Ugh, Yosuke texted me like a million times,” Chie said.

“Did something happen?” Yukiko said. “Is Souji-kun all right?”

Chie shook her head, and then cut into the steak again. “I think Souji-kun had to help his uncle around the house today, so he’s bored,” Chie said. “Why can’t he bother Kanji-kun or Teddie instead, though? Sheesh.”

“He likes spending time with you,” Yukiko said, and giggled when Chie’s face contorted into a look of horrified disbelief. “I think it’s nice.”

“Ugh, _you_ try having to deal with him clinging to you every time something happens,” Chie said. “He invites himself over when you’re not around.”

“I wouldn’t mind if he came over while I’m there.”

“Haha… no.” Chie popped the piece of steak into her mouth, and chewed. Yukiko took a moment to imagine what things would be like with Yosuke there, and then realized that with Yosuke’s talent for bad timing and inconveniencing others—she still hadn’t forgotten that swimsuit incident—they were probably better off without him. She speared a tomato on her fork.

“You know, I think this is the first time that someone hasn’t crashed out date,” Chie said, looking around the restaurant as though someone they knew might interrupt at any second.

“Is it?” Yukiko said. Just to be on the safe side, she looked over her shoulder, too. “I almost hadn’t notice.”

“Yeah, I didn’t until I realized I was waiting for Naoto-kun to show up,” Chie said. “I don’t get how she does that, just appearing on a whim.”

“She’s normally with Rise-chan and Kanji-kun,” Yukiko said. “The three of them travel in a pack, don’t they?”

Chie shrugged, indicating that she didn’t really care, either way. “We should do this more often,” Chie said. Under the table, Chie’s foot brushed against her calf.

Yukiko blushed, and smiled around her glass of water. She thought back to the love hotel and the receptionist, the cue to go visit another love hotel, which had to be more modern and more sophisticated than the barebones place they had gone to; then thought to the long train ride in, the long one that awaited them, and the strange loneliness of just the two of them.

“Maybe next time we should try karaoke,” she said. “I heard some girls talking about the private booth discount you can get if you go early in the evening.” Chie choked on her steak. A second later, Yukiko realized why. “Chie!”

“Arrgh,” Chie said helplessly, and downed half a glass of water.

“I didn’t mean that we should—that’s…” Was her face heating up because she thought it was a bad idea, or because she wanted to try it? Oh, she missed the days when she could pretend she had no sex drive. They sat in silence for a while, their minds on separate tracks, but unmistakably converging.

“Next time,” Chie said, her breathing apparently restored, “we’re going to a different one of those hotels.”

“Oh, yes,” Yukiko said. “Of course.”

“Not that the one you chose was bad, but it looked like someone had died in the shower, it was that gross, and—”

“I know, Chie,” Yukiko said.

“Oh.” Chie’s eyes dropped down to her plate. Then she looked back up and ran her hand through her fingers. She looked on the verge of saying something important or great, and Yukiko felt a surge of overwhelming affection— “People are dumb.”

“Haha! They are, aren’t they?” Chie stole the second-to-last tomato from Yukiko’s plate. The restaurant was loud and noisy and Chie’s foot was being extremely inappropriate. Yukiko didn’t think it’d be wise to stop her, though.

“You have, you know.” Chie flicked her thumb against Yukiko’s cheek. Yukiko brought her hand up to get it, but Chie shook her head and leaned in.

The restaurant was busy, but their table was a small one near the wall, and no one seemed to be watching them. And even if they were, maybe they’d interpret it just as a kiss between friends, not seeing the tongue flicking out to catch the bit of fruit, though Yukiko could feel it: the rough texture of the tip of Chie’s tongue, then the smoother underside. She ought to do something, turn her head and kiss Chie on the mouth, but not here or at least, not so soon, which was what she thought. And then she did it anyway, quick and closed mouthed, before she could stop herself. And afterwards nothing happened, or at least, Yukiko didn’t think anything had happened. The restaurant was as boisterous as ever, each table absorbed in its own world. Yukiko felt, with aching certainty, that they wouldn’t have been able to do this at home, in a town full of familiar faces. Yukiko heard, in her head, the battle-cry of all disappointed mothers: _what have I ever done to deserve a daughter like you?_ which would be, inevitably, their parents’ first reaction, though it certainly wouldn’t—she hoped—be their second or third. Maybe someday.

“It’s snowing,” Chie said, nodding to the window.

“It’s pretty,” Yukiko said. They were nearly done with their meal, and she was in the mood for something sweet. “We should stop by that café.”

“Maybe next time,” Chie said. “We’ll miss the train.”

She imagined the snow falling on the rice paddies, on the top of the mountains near her house, the frost-covered fields. She imagined all of that set against the early winter twilight. Home would always be there for them, waiting for their inevitable return. People were the same everywhere, she knew, and the world was as big as she could make it to be. Still, there were so many things she wanted to do here, and so many more things she wanted to do with Chie.

“Maybe next time,” Yukiko said.

“Yeah,” Chie said. Her hand covered Yukiko’s. “It’s a promise.”


End file.
